Walter Ariel Risi proposes some patterns for hiring productive people that remind me of research done in the early days of patterns by Jim Coplien, who found that hyperproductive teams included, in many cases, musicians! In the old days, companies often hired smart people from other disciplines because software engineering or computer science hadn't joined the academic production of certified, degreed contributors. With the current focus now on degrees, I wonder if we've lost something important.